Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone!
Hope you all had a lovely day. Though I'd share with you what I've been up to.

Christmas necklace from Thriftola.

Owl 'engagement' ring off Jenny.

Christmas vegan cupcakes by Ms Cupcake, clockwise from top left; triple choc, oh christmint tree (mine), mince pie and apple spice.

Christmas presents - aka spoilt.

Can't wait for my Jake film fest :D

I asked for a Heart Rate Monitor to get serious with my training in the New Year. My dad also gave me a sprouting kit (that he's clearly going to steal from me!)

For Christmas dinner we go up to my Aunty Mary's house (aka YM). Me and my Dad had a jokey bet on to see who could get YM to swear first. I won as she was showing me her joke Christmas present which was a lump of poo. I kept asking her what it was and she said "s**t" hehe. Its always so nice to see everyone, but this year we got to briefly see Aunty Barbara! She's a fan of the blog and usually gets me a necklace so look at what it was :O

Yey!

After YM's we go through to see my dad's cousin and his family in Durham. John Lavery (JL) always gets us jokey calenders, mine are usually "hunks" or something which he finds hilarious and I never use. This year I got this calender:

I think I will use this, bit of a novelty! Thanks JL!

Hope you all had a great time and hope Santa was kind!
I must go to sleep now as I'm one of those sados who goes to the Metro Centre early for the sales.
xxx

Belated Birthday.

This is a (very) belated birthday blog post! Ooops!

I turned the ripe old age of 25 on the 4th November, and it was amazing.
I started off the celebrations on Thursday 3rd November by going to see Britney Spears at Newcastle Arena. I'd love to say I saw her live, but I don't think I can as she mimed! It was still amazing though!

I got home to find my birthday bedding on my bed ready for sleep :)

Love Cath Kidston - and love that this is from the children's range which is called "Cath Kids" ha. (If you're wondering that owl is my 'hottie' and I've named it Eglantine after the cute little owl in The Legends of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole)

When I woke up as a 25-year-old I opened my cards etc off my family and then decided to get stuck into my presents off Jenny (and Max). I met Jenny two days before my birthday and was so excited as they were wrapped up so nicely :D

YEY!

 She even made me this brilliant card! So lovely!

I then went volunteering at GVOC (I'm a teaching assistant, helping adults with learning disabilities) and they sang me Happy Birthday :)

I got home to an unidentified parcel. Well, I knew it was off my good friend Lucy (and Harry) as Lucy text me saying she forgot to put the card in. Haha.

There is a lovely owl necklace from Forever 21 and some other great bits and bobs :)

I also had a little parcel and card from my very dear friend Billie who is currently in Berlin (Hi Bill!). It's a lovely hand-made tissue holder in owl fabric :D

I then got ready as I went out for my tea to Jack Sprats in Newcastle with my parents, best friend Hayley and neighbour Yvonne.

I didn't take any photos of the food, so here is a photo of my birthday nails.

The next day was obviously bonfire night. I changed my nails to look like fireworks, but apart from turning out to be a big mess I don't have any photos as my laptop died a few days later so I don't have that pic anymore. Sob.
I had some lovely cakes by Ms. Cupcake. My dad had been to London a couple of weeks prior and came home with 12 cakes (6 for then and 6 to freeze for my birthday weekend). I had a rose cupcake on my birthday, but we ate our way through these on the Saturday.

SO good!

On Saturday night, after spending all day getting ready and still ending up in a rush(!!) me and Hayley went to town to meet some other friends and had a very eventful, but enjoyable night.
Here are some photos.

Me and Jenny in Bar 42. 

Photo of the night is probably this one of me and Lowell (also in Bar 42).

Sorry I haven't posted for a while and then gave a short post, but like I said before my laptop died. Its a bit of a nightmare trying to blog on my slow, small netbook. Also tomorrow I'm going to a blogger meet up and then Hanson (don't ask) so I need to get to sleep!
x

Baby, baby, baby ohhhh.

Last week I made a little trek up to Newbiggin-by-the-sea to visit my friend Kelly and her new baby Neve. I used to work with Kelly at the cinema so known her for a long time, and worked with her husband Jordan for even longer, so was really pleased for them both when Neve was born 3 months ago.
She was such a cute little baby, and even though she had just been getting over a tummy bug she was very happy. Some babies hate new people but Neve didn't seem to mind me which is good!

I bought Neve the cutest onesies!
As I love owls I had to buy these (and was tempted to keep them for myself even though I don't have a boyfriend yet let alone a baby - crazy I know haha).

so cute!


The best part is that they come with a little pink owl soft toy that Neve can keep forever, so she can always remember me and how good owls are :)

:)

The Gift.

During my first year of my Social Anthropology degree at SOAS I learned about the importance of the ritual of gift giving and exchange.
Marcel Mauss was a French Sociologist/Anthropologist who came from Durkheim's school. Mauss argued that gifts are never "free", he believed that sometimes humans do not want to be caught up in the practise of gift giving but due to the nature of the exchange they are left trapped in the obligation to give. If you have received a gift you must also give a gift. If you do not give, the spirit of the gift is broken and bad things will/may occur. *

I decided that grouping my necklaces into ones which were gifts would be a good way to show you the part of my collection that I didn't buy for myself.
As I didn't buy or chose these necklaces for myself it's hard to tell you where they are all from.

I'm starting off with necklaces I got for Christmas off my Aunty Barbara and Uncle Hal. AB reads this blog sometimes so hello!

I think I got this at Christmas 2009?

This one I got Christmas 2010.
If I'm honest I probably wouldn't buy these necklaces myself, as they're not the same sort of style I collect. However having said that I do really like them both. I think in some ways the fact I'd not buy them myself makes them better as it's good to have someone elses style input sometimes.
They are both beautiful necklaces and very unusual.....especially compared to my other necklaces! So I'm pleased with these :)

Next up is a heart necklace from Dorothy Perkins my best friend Hayley bought me for Christmas 2010. Again I probably wouldn't buy this myself, but again I really like it. I'm pretty sure Hayley told me part of the reason she bought me it was so she could borrow it. She hasn't yet, but if she does move back to Newcastle soon I'm sure it won't be long before she does!

Next up is a little girl necklace that my ex housemates (and very good friends) Lucy and Harry brought back from me on their recent trip to New York. It's my first Forever 21 item and I LOVE it. I can't wait to visit the newly opened Oxford Street store.

This owl locket is my most recent necklace! I got this off Jenny on Tuesday! She bought me it as a thank you because I told her about a job vacancy which she got!
As you will all know I love owls so this is great! Its a locket so me and Jenny decided I should put a photo of Jake Gyllenhaal and James Lafferty (aka Nathan Scott) in it. We were watching One Tree Hill and talking about how if a Jake G question came up on Pointless I'd totally win. Haha.


I hope you enjoyed my post, if you want more anthropology related posts then be sure to check out my friend Catherine's blog over at Style anthro. Also, I'm starting up an Anthropology of (vegan) Food blog, which I will link here once its all sorted.
Enjoy!

*sorry if my facts are wrong and/or confusing Mauss' argument with Sahlins, its been a long while since I read either and I'm going purely off memory as I can't find my notes!

I love sales.

A little while ago I went sale shopping and found some good bargains in River Island.

:)

The banana earrings are so fun and were only £1! They were £3.99 originally. They're quite summery, so maybe I won't wear them much when the winter takes hold but we'll see.

These hair clips were £2 instead of £4.99. I love owls (but you probably know that!) so had to get them. I think the clips are very autumnal, so will get a fair amount of usage.

The pineapple necklace had the biggest reduction - £5 down from £14.99. It's a big (and heavy!) pineapple on a long gold chain so is a bit of a statement piece. Like the earrings quite summery, however I can imagine wearing this at any time of year with a plain outfit.


Did you manage to snap up any bargains?

Tatty Devine sale!

Last weekend Tatty Devine had a bank holiday madness sale. There were several things I wanted to buy, but not having much money I only bought two. A necklace (obvz) and a large lucky dip.
My items came today in the post.

This owl is a hand made ceramic necklace which was supposed to cost £72 but I got it for £20! There was only 8 to buy on the sale day so I'm guessing it's pretty rare and they're all slightly different due to being hand made. As its ceramic I'm only going to wear it on special occasions as its heavy and I think it will break easy (hence being wrapped in bubble wrap). I love it though :)

My lucky dip contains a musical necklace, a couple of brooches, some gun earrings and a cat ring (which is too small for my fingers!) If I'm honest I don't know if I'd have bought any of these items individually, but I do like the necklace and LOVE the ice cream cone brooch, it'll be such a good summer wear!

Did anyone else get anything from the Tatty sale?

Owl be there for you.

I LOVE owls. LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE them! I have millions of owl related things, mugs, candles, ornaments, bags, toys, socks, and of course NECKLACES!

Here is a photo of my selection of owl necklaces that I bought from Lady Luck Rules OK! over the years. The line at the top are felt owl mothers with a little baby. The one on the top left hand corner was the first one I bought, and sadly lost an eye. The second green and purple owl mother/baby combo I got from a LLROK goodie bag. Originally I was going to give it away as a present, but I love my owls too much! The brown and blue felt owls I bought from ebay.
 The bottom left is Orly owl, the first necklace I ever bought from LLROK (I think!). Next to Orly is the night owl, really good to wear on a night owlet (geddit?) and last but not least is the red owl which is on a long silver chain and probably the owl I wear the least, sorry red owl!

Here is my favourite owl close up, but remember owlies I love you all.

Orly is my favourite for sentimental reasons as if he wasn't the first necklace from LLROK he was deffo one of the first and the first owl I bought. Also he comes on a rainbow lace chain free chain and is rubber so is super fun to wear and brightens up all my owlfits. Ok I'll stop now....